Shayla Black (18 page)

“
I’ve long wondered why Maddie put herself on a shelf at such a young age,” Edith said as if she weren’t there.

“
I have no wish to marry again,” she reminded them.

“
A shame, really. I found the marriage bed to be one of the most enjoyable aspects of my union with Mr. Bickham,” Edith twittered.

Maddie felt her mouth drop open again. “Aunt Edith!”

The older woman waved her scandalized expression away. “Pooh. You’re a widow with a child, as well as a man seeking your hand. You know what I speak of.”

“
Yes,” Maddie admitted with reluctance.

“
If you refuse to wed Mr. Taylor, why not enjoy whatever else the association might offer?”

This time, Maddie’s eyes widened as her jaw dropped. “You, a proper woman, are suggesting an improper liaison?” Of course, hadn’t she suggested the same herself to Brock?

Aunt Edith flounced into a chair and grabbed a slice of bread from a plate Vema had retrieved from the adjacent sideboard. “You would hardly be the first widow to take a lover, dear. Nor the last, I daresay.”

Maddie could hardly believe her ears. Her own aunt condoned a lover, even sounding as if she might have taken one herself in the past.

Drawing in a deep breath, Maddie doctored the cup of tea that Vema set in front of her. Stirring an absent spoon through her brew, she wondered if these two women, richer with life experience, could help her succeed in seducing Brock. Maddie needed to do more than merely interest him. She had to send him to the edge, as he had done to her last night, then push him farther. Could Brock’s restraint withstand such sensual torture? Sipping her tea, Maddie decided she could do no worse with Edith and Vema’s advice than without.

“
It is common enough for widows to take lovers,” she conceded. “But how does one go about such an affair?”

Edith laughed. “Silly girl! You’re clever, so I’ve no doubt you will find just the way to tell him.”

Maddie felt heat creeping up her cheeks. “Actually, I have told him. He wishes to wait for marriage. Wants to do the thing properly and all that.”

“
And you do not wish to wait. How delicious!” she rubbed her hands together. “Can we not help with that, Vema?”

The two women cast a glance between them rich with mischief.

“
She needs the
Kama Sutra
,” declared Vema quietly.

“
The what?” Maddie questioned the uncommon phrase.

“
The
Kama Sutra
,” Vema repeated. “It is an old Hindu text, dating back over a thousand years, filled with descriptions to enhance one’s Kama, or sensual gratification.”

Maddie resisted the urge to gape in shock again.
Someone had written a book on bed sport over a thousand years ago?

“
It is also about achieving harmony in one’s soul through balancing the
Dharma
, your religious merit, and your
Artha
, your worldly wealth, with your
Kama
. According to its author, Vatsyayana, if you find that symmetry, you will succeed in everything, including finding a compatible life mate.”

Her soul was not lacking balance, thank you, nor did she need a life mate. If marriage to the sullen Colin had been bad, she could not imagine marriage to a man as ruthless as Brock. He was likely to reject her wish for autonomy, but be able to control her body with his skilled lovemaking. However, if the text these ladies spoke of could prove useful in winning this blasted wager and easing her unsatisfied body, she wanted to read it.

“
Do you have this book?” Maddie asked, hopeful.

Vema glanced at Edith, whose aging cheeks flushed.

“
I believe I do, dear,” her aunt said. “I shall see if I can find it in the attic.”

Though Maddie sensed the book had not been put away in storage at all, she bit her lip on the subject. “Thank you, Aunt Edith. I do believe such a book could prove helpful.”

Imagining all the ways she could surprise and arouse Brock into surrender, she slathered butter on a piece of bread, feeling more optimistic than she had in weeks.

#

Clutching the imperious missive in his hand, Brock read it again.

Mr. Taylor,

I have questions regarding our endeavor. Come to my home this afternoon at four. I expect a complete status on every parcel of land.

Gavin Daggett, Duke of Cropthorne

Cursing roundly, Brock crumpled the thick-papered note in his fist. A page bearing the duke’s livery had delivered it to his office at ten this morning. Brock had been fighting a dense anxiety since.

Cropthorne knew. Somehow, the man had managed to find out about Maddie’s land and its tentative status. God forbid, if somehow Cropthorne had learned about his wager with Maddie. Any hint of a possible scandal would send him running.

Brock sighed, pressing tight fingertips to his aching forehead. Damn, what could he tell Cropthorne? Certainly not that he had done his utmost last night to make Maddie surrender. That he’d kissed her mouth, her breasts, her feet, the slick folds. Kissed her until she had moaned, panted... made him sweat and ache to take her on the sofa as she wore nothing but the stockings filming her shapely legs. She had panted, so wet, thighs taut with need, fingers gripping him in clenched fists as she’d begged him for more.

Damn. He should be focused on business. Instead, he kept seeing Maddie in his mind, golden by firelight, head thrown back, hair as fiery as her passion.

With a frustrated grunt, he tossed Cropthorne’s missive across the swaying coach and propped a shiny black Hessian on the seat across from him. Why could he fire Maddie’s body, but not overcome the objections clouding her mind?

The Maddie of old, that girl in the hay, had been full of spontaneous desire. She had raised no objections to their lovemaking. Indeed, she had encouraged him, seemed eager to take him in, despite her virginity. Her passion had overridden her natural caution. Why could he not achieve the same ends with her reserve about marriage?

Brock did not delude himself; she refused for the same reason Maddie had broken faith with him five years ago: He did not possess a drop of blue blood. Though she had come to his rescue after Lady Litchfield’s slight, that had been her kindness, her sense of fairness. But Maddie still believed him beneath her.

His coach came to a jarring halt in front of Cropthorne’s town house. With all the enthusiasm of a condemned man, Brock climbed out and made his way to the door. Within minutes, a servant showed him into Cropthorne’s massive, dark-paneled study.

Behind a huge desk sat the duke, all hue and size of shelved books serving as background. Brock knew by looking at Cropthorne’s tense, angular face that he was in for a fight.

“
Sit down, Mr. Taylor, and I’ll get right to the point.”

Sinking into a George III mahogany library chair, Brock did as the man bid. The duke’s displeasure increased the rapping of the anxious drum beating in his stomach. Brock tried to shrug off his foreboding.

“
I received a letter from Kent Wainwright, Viscount Belwick,” Cropthorne spit out quickly. “Apparently, he knows I’m your primary investor for the railroad project.”

“
Belwick makes it his business to know when someone is pitted against him in a business venture.”

Cropthorne leaned forward, eyes narrowed. Clearly, he had not appreciated Brock’s observation. “He’s also learned that you are poised to buy every parcel of land necessary, except one in Warwickshire. Is that true?”

Gritting his teeth to hold in a biting curse, Brock drew in a sharp breath. He wondered how much Cropthorne knew and decided to take a gamble.

“
The parcel isn’t legally for sale. A woman inherited it, but not outright. She holds it in retainer. The land may only be owned by any future husband she takes.”

“
What?” Cropthorne nearly came out of his chair. “I thought that old practice died centuries ago. Who the hell would leave land to a woman in such a manner?”

So Cropthorne didn’t know the land was his distant cousin Maddie’s. He wasn’t about to tell his demanding investor, either. Not only might Cropthorne object to Brock’s methods against his kin of the fairer sex, he could well object to the marriage. And this time, nothing, no one, would stand in his way of acquiring not only more wealth, but Maddie herself.

Brock forced himself to relax. “The woman’s affections are...engaged at the moment, and I feel sure she will wed within a month. Two at most. Her future husband will sell to us.”

“
You’ve spoken with him, then?”

“
Yes.” The half-truth came out in a robust syllable that made Brock’s teeth hurt. “I’ve even arranged clandestine meetings for them, to hurry their courtship along.”

With a raised brow and the cocking of his head, Cropthorne conveyed the fact he was impressed. But his eyes still drilled Brock to his chair. “What if this woman doesn’t wed?”

“
She will,” Brock assured, hoping like hell he could live up to that promise. He didn’t want to explain to Cropthorne that rivers and hills and Belwick’s holdings would take the railroad far out of its straight path and drive the construction costs as high as the moon.

Cropthorne banged his fist on the solid desk. “One month, damn it. Those banns had better start posting in one month, or Belwick will beat us to construction and you can find yourself a new partner. Am I making myself clear?”

“
Perfectly.”

Brock hid his worry behind an impervious mask. Christ, he had more at risk here than Cropthorne, his fortune, his reputation, an aristocratic beauty he’d never forgotten—everything he’d sweated all his life for was tied up in this railroad—and hinged on Maddie becoming his wife.

His mind raced. Paddington. Yes, he would go there tonight. Use every method, every whispered word within his power, to seduce her. She had to marry him, damn it, and soon.

Cropthorne rose. “I want to hear about your progress in two weeks, Mr. Taylor.”

“
Consider it done,” he said smoothly.

“
And from now on, I expect to hear about
everything
that affects my investment.”

Brock left with a nod, knowing Cropthorne wouldn’t want to know absolutely everything. The truth, unless he convinced Maddie to wed him soon, would only ensure that he lost Cropthorne’s backing for the railroad and suffered a shattered reputation forever.

#

Brock entered the silent cottage in Paddington later that evening. Determination beat an urgent dance in his veins as he removed his gloves. Maddie would marry him. Tonight, she would agree—finally—no matter what he had to do.

As he divested himself of his greatcoat, a vision of Maddie stormed his mind, strands of her copper tresses clinging to her damp face, sleek, flushed body bare for his hungry eyes and hands. Brock’s cock grew stiff imagining all the ways he could continue his seduction, awaken every inch of her, persuade her to let him fulfill her every desire.

The need to possess her—her body, her land, her hand in marriage—plagued him until he could think of little else.

Brock could not remember any woman who had stirred him so much. Perhaps the game they played provided extra impetus, but he feared that his need had everything to do with his heart.

Shoving his musings aside, he wandered into the house and concentrated on this evening. As soon as Maddie consented to wed him, he would make love to her, a lightning fast union with gasping insistence and need. He would follow that with a long, slow melding of bodies that would last half the night. Then he would slide inside her again come dawn, just to hear her cries of passion.

Maybe then he could stop dwelling on her when he should be focused on investments, the railroad, on money—the pulse beat of his life.

Brock frowned when he realized Maddie was nowhere in sight. His gaze skimmed over the velvety sofa, a pair of green baize chairs atop a matching Persian carpet resplendent with burgundy accents. The orange-yellow glow of a fire crackling in the hearth told him she was likely here.

A search of the kitchen, study, and garden also proved empty. Scowling, he trekked back to the entry and started up one of the twin staircases that led to the bedrooms, taking two stairs in a single stride.

“
Maddie?” he called.

“
In the bed chamber,” came her soft reply from behind the door of the master suite at the hall’s end.

Was she hurt, unwell? Had she caught a plague, a pox, a wretched fever?

Or did she lie in wait for him?

Sprinting, Brock pushed his way through the door, shoving it open with an impatient sweep of his arm. He had expected almost anything.

But nothing could have prepared him for this Maddie.